If you already know the Polish question words — kto, co, gdzie, kiedy, jak, ile, który — then you already know, for free, how to say someone, something, somewhere, sometime, somehow, some amount, one of them. Polish builds its indefinite pronouns with one tiny, completely regular suffix: -ś. Stick -ś onto a question word and it stops asking and starts vaguely pointing: kto? ("who?") → ktoś ("someone"). A second suffix, -kolwiek, makes the free-choice "any-at-all" series. This is one of the most economical corners of Polish grammar, and this page shows you how to exploit it.
The -ś series: "some-"
The pattern is mechanical. Take the bare interrogative, add -ś:
| Question word |
| Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| kto (who) | ktoś | someone, somebody |
| co (what) | coś | something |
| gdzie (where) | gdzieś | somewhere |
| kiedy (when) | kiedyś | sometime, once, one day |
| jak (how) | jakoś | somehow |
| jaki (what kind) | jakiś | some, a certain, a kind of |
| który (which) | któryś | one of them, some one |
| ile (how much/many) | ileś | some amount, an unspecified number |
| czyj (whose) | czyjś | someone's |
| dokąd (where to) | dokądś | (to) somewhere |
The semantic effect is "exists but unidentified" — there is a person/thing/place, the speaker just can't or won't name it.
Ktoś dzwonił, kiedy byłeś pod prysznicem.
Someone called while you were in the shower.
Chcę coś zjeść, umieram z głodu.
I want to eat something, I'm starving.
Mieszka gdzieś w Krakowie, nie pamiętam dokładnie gdzie.
She lives somewhere in Kraków, I don't remember exactly where.
Kiedyś byłem w Tokio, jakieś dziesięć lat temu.
I was in Tokyo once, some ten years ago.
The -ś forms still decline
Crucially, ktoś and coś are not frozen. The case ending goes inside, between the stem and the -ś: you decline the kto/co part and keep the -ś riding along at the end. So the genitive of ktoś is kogoś, the dative is komuś, and so on:
| Case | ktoś (someone) | coś (something) |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | ktoś | coś |
| Genitive | kogoś | czegoś |
| Dative | komuś | czemuś |
| Accusative | kogoś | coś |
| Instrumental | kimś | czymś |
| Locative | (o) kimś | (o) czymś |
The same logic you learned for kto/co governs the case here: the verb or preposition decides it.
Szukam kogoś, kto zna się na komputerach.
I'm looking for someone who knows about computers. (kogoś — genitive after szukać)
Muszę ci o czymś powiedzieć.
I have to tell you about something. (czymś — locative after o)
Rozmawiałam z kimś z twojej firmy.
I spoke with someone from your company. (kimś — instrumental after z)
Daj to komuś, kto tego potrzebuje.
Give it to someone who needs it. (komuś — dative)
jakiś and któryś are adjective-like: they decline for gender, number, and case the way an adjective does (jakiś, jakaś, jakieś; jakiegoś, jakimś…). They agree with the noun they accompany:
Dzwonił jakiś pan i pytał o ciebie.
Some man called and asked about you. (jakiś — masculine, agreeing with pan)
Mam jakieś pytanie, ale zapomniałam jakie.
I have some question, but I forgot what. (jakieś — neuter, agreeing with pytanie)
Któryś z chłopców zostawił tu plecak.
One of the boys left a backpack here. (któryś z + genitive plural)
A softening "vague" use of jakiś
Beyond "a certain", jakiś often works as a hedge meaning "about / -ish / some sort of", taking the edge off a statement. Jakieś dziesięć minut is "about ten minutes"; jakiś dziwny is "kind of strange". This is everyday, informal-leaning but fully standard:
Poczekaj jakieś pięć minut, zaraz schodzę.
Wait about five minutes, I'm coming down. (jakieś = roughly)
On jest dzisiaj jakiś smutny.
He seems kind of sad today. (jakiś softening 'sad')
The -kolwiek series: free-choice "any-"
Where -ś means "some specific-but-unknown one", -kolwiek means "any one at all, it doesn't matter which" — the free-choice "any". It attaches to the same question words: ktokolwiek (anyone at all), cokolwiek (anything at all/whatever), gdziekolwiek (anywhere at all), kiedykolwiek (ever, at any time), jakikolwiek (any sort whatsoever), którykolwiek (any one of them).
Jeśli ktokolwiek pyta, mnie tu nie było.
If anyone (at all) asks, I wasn't here.
Możemy się spotkać kiedykolwiek ci pasuje.
We can meet whenever suits you.
The contrast with -ś is real and worth feeling. Chcę coś zjeść = "I want to eat something" (there's a particular hunger, you'll pick a thing). Zjem cokolwiek = "I'll eat anything" (the choice is wide open, you don't care which). Like the -ś forms, cokolwiek and ktokolwiek decline — the case ending goes before -kolwiek: czegokolwiek, komukolwiek, kimkolwiek.
Nie bój się prosić kogokolwiek o pomoc.
Don't be afraid to ask anyone (at all) for help. (kogokolwiek — accusative object of prosić)
A note on "any" in negatives and questions
English uses any in three places: free choice (pick any card), questions (do you have any money?), and negatives (I don't have any money). Polish splits these. Free choice is -kolwiek (or just jakiś). But in a negative sentence, English "any" maps onto the negative pronouns nikt/nic/żaden with obligatory double negation — I don't see anything is Nic nie widzę, not anything with -kolwiek. And in a neutral question, Polish often simply uses jakiś or no determiner at all: Masz jakieś pieniądze? ("Do you have any money?"). See /grammar/polish/pronouns/negative/nikt-nic for the negative side.
Common Mistakes
❌ Rozmawiałem z ktoś.
Incorrect — after z (instrumental) it must be z kimś; the case goes inside, before -ś.
✅ Rozmawiałem z kimś.
I talked with someone.
Don't leave ktoś/coś frozen. Decline the kto/co core and keep -ś on the end: kimś, kogoś, czegoś, czymś.
❌ Szukam ktoś, kto mi pomoże.
Incorrect — szukać governs the genitive, so kogoś.
✅ Szukam kogoś, kto mi pomoże.
I'm looking for someone who'll help me.
The verb's case government applies to the indefinite exactly as to the plain pronoun.
❌ Nie widzę cokolwiek.
Incorrect — in a negative sentence Polish uses the negative pronoun with double negation.
✅ Nic nie widzę.
I don't see anything.
English "any" in a negative is Polish nic/nikt + nie, not cokolwiek. Cokolwiek is free choice ("anything at all"), not negative polarity.
❌ Dzwonił jakiś pani.
Incorrect — jakiś must agree in gender with the feminine noun: jakaś.
✅ Dzwoniła jakaś pani.
Some woman called.
Jakiś is adjective-like and must agree: jakiś pan, jakaś pani, jakieś dziecko, jacyś ludzie. The verb agrees too (dzwoniła, feminine).
❌ Jakoś pytanie mam.
Incorrect — confusing the adverb jakoś (somehow) with the adjective jakieś (some).
✅ Mam jakieś pytanie.
I have some question.
Jakoś = "somehow" (from jak, an adverb); jakiś/jakaś/jakieś = "some, a certain" (from jaki, an adjective). They look similar but do different jobs.
Key Takeaways
- Add -ś to a question word for the indefinite "some-": kto → ktoś, co → coś, gdzie → gdzieś, kiedy → kiedyś, jak → jakoś, jaki → jakiś.
- The case ending goes inside, before -ś: kogoś, komuś, kimś; czegoś, czemuś, czymś — the verb/preposition still governs the case.
- jakiś / któryś are adjective-like and agree in gender, number, and case with their noun.
- Add -kolwiek for free-choice "any at all": ktokolwiek, cokolwiek, gdziekolwiek, kiedykolwiek — these also decline.
- English "any" in negatives is not -kolwiek but the negative pronouns nic/nikt with double negation.
Related Topics
- Negative Pronouns and Double Negation: nikt, nic, nigdyA2 — Polish requires double (and triple) negation: a negative pronoun like nikt or nic does not replace the verb's nie but stacks with it — Nikt nie przyszedł, literally 'nobody didn't come'.
- Interrogative Pronouns: kto, coA1 — The question words kto 'who' and co 'what' fully decline — the case you choose telegraphs how the answer fits into the sentence, and kto always triggers masculine agreement.
- Question Words: kto, co, gdzie, kiedy, dlaczego, jakA1 — How Polish wh-questions work: the question word goes first, the rest keeps statement order, there's no 'do' auxiliary, intonation falls — and kto/co/który must appear in the exact case their role in the sentence demands.
- Double and Multiple NegationA2 — Polish requires negative concord — words like nikt, nic, nigdy must co-occur with verbal nie, and stacking negatives makes a sentence more negative, never positive.
- Verb Government: Which Case a Verb TakesB1 — Which case a Polish verb demands for its object — a categorized overview of accusative, genitive, dative, instrumental, and prepositional government, with the insight that the Polish case rarely matches the English preposition.